Research, editing : Gan Yung Chyan, KUCINTA SETIA
The study, conducted from December 2020 to December 2021, looked at deaths after a hospital stay for myocarditis or with myocarditis listed as a cause of death on a death certificate among 42.8 million vaccinated people in England age 13 and up.
The publication of the study’s findings in the American Heart Association’s journal, Circulation, marked the first time in the medical literature that researchers have confirmed that myocarditis associated with one of the covi vaccines can result in death. The article was published online on 22 August 2022 and appears in the journal’s issue dated 5 September 2022.
“This is really big, to talk about deaths. CDC keeps saying, ‘generally mild, generally mild,” cardiologist Sanjay Verma, who was not involved in the research, told The Epoch Times. “There’s been a concerted campaign to emphasize that people have not died from myocarditis and that it’s generally mild.”
Myocarditis is defined as inflammation of the myocardium, the middle layer of the heart muscle. Although the CDC has acknowledged since the spring of 2021 that myocarditis is a possible side effect of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, the agency has not publicly spoken about death as a possible outcome of myocarditis.
The authors of the study in Circulation looked at patient data pulled from the national health database for all those in England age 13 and up who received at least one dose of one of three vaccines available in that country: AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BioNTech, and Moderna.
About 20 million people got the AstraZeneca vaccine, 20 million got the Pfizer vaccine, and just over 1 million got the Moderna vaccine.
The study tracked hospital admissions and deaths from myocarditis by age and gender and in relation to how many doses of each vaccine a person had received. It compared how many cases of myocarditis were associated with a recent covi infection, and how many were associated with one of the vaccines.
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22 people died within 28 days of receiving the first dose of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccination
Of the people who received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and were hospitalized for myocarditis or with myocarditis listed on their death certificates, 22 people (17 percent) died within 28 days of receiving the first dose, 14 people (12 percent) died after their second dose, and 13 people (15 percent) died after getting the Pfizer-BioNTech booster.
News (3)
40 people died of myocarditis after the first dose of AstraZeneca vaccine
For the AstraZeneca vaccine, 40 people died of myocarditis after the first dose and 11 after the second dose, 28 percent and 12 percent respectively.
Among those who got the Moderna vaccine, there were no myocarditis deaths within 28 days of vaccination.
News (4)
Study limited to the 28 days following covi vaccination
The study concluded that, in general, the risk of myocarditis from covi was greater than the risk of myocarditis from the vaccines but there was no control group of unvaccinated people, the study was limited to the 28 days following vaccination, and the conclusion did not hold for all ages or all of the vaccines.
News (5)
Risk of myocarditis after a second dose of Moderna almost four times higher than the risk of myocarditis after a covi infection
For males under 40, the risk of myocarditis after a second dose of the Moderna vaccine was almost four times higher than the risk of myocarditis after a SARS-CoV-2 infection, the data showed.
The study is a follow-up to a prior study in which the authors reported an association between the first and second dose of the vaccines and myocarditis.
Neither the CDC nor the FDA has ever acknowledged that any American has died from myocarditis caused by one of the COVID-19 vaccines.
The most recent version of the CDC advisory on adverse events after covi vaccination said that as of 31 August 2022, there were 1,022 “preliminary reports” of myocarditis and pericarditis for people under 18 in the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), and that 672 of them had been verified and had met the CDC’s working definition of myocarditis or pericarditis.
However, there is no mention of death as a possible outcome.
“Most patients with myocarditis or pericarditis after COVID-19 vaccination responded well to medicine and rest and felt better quickly,” the advisory said.
A CDC morbidity and mortality report from February 2022 referenced one reported death from myocarditis but offered no confirmation.
“One death was reported; investigation is ongoing, and other contributory factors for myocarditis are being evaluated,” it said.
A CDC advisory on adverse effects of covi vaccines linked to a January 25, 2022, study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), which found that the risk of myocarditis increased after both the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines and was highest after the second dose in adolescents and young men.
The JAMA study alluded to deaths without confirming any, saying that among people under 30, there were “no confirmed cases of myocarditis in those who died after mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccination without another identifiable cause” and that two other deaths “with potential myocarditis” are under investigation.
See also: https://staygate.blogspot.com/2022/09/sinopharm-vaccine-causes-lethal-skin.html
News (6)
CDC director admits agency gave false information on covi vaccine safety monitoring
Reporter : Zachary Stieber, The Epoch Times PREMIUM
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has acknowledged publicly for the first time that the agency gave false information about its COVID-19 vaccine safety monitoring.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the agency’s director, said in a letter made public on Sept. 12 that the CDC did not analyze certain types of adverse event reports at all in 2021, despite the agency previously saying it started in February 2021.
“CDC performed PRR analysis between March 25, 2022, through July 31, 2022,” Walensky said. “CDC also recently addressed a previous statement made to the Epoch Times to clarify PRR were not run between February 26, 2021, to September 30, 2021.”
Walensky’s agency had promised in several documents, starting in early 2021, to perform a type of analysis called Proportional Reporting Ratio (PRR) on reports submitted to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, which it helps manage.
But the agency said in June that it did not perform PRRs. It also said that performing them was “outside th[e] agency’s purview.”
Confronted with the contradiction, Dr. John Su, a CDC official, told The Epoch Times in July that the agency started performing PRRs in February 2021 and “continues to do so to date.”
But just weeks later, the CDC said Su was wrong.
“CDC performed PRRs from March 25, 2022 through July 31, 2022,” a spokeswoman told The Epoch Times in August.
Walensky’s new letter, dated Sept. 2 and sent on Sept. 6 to Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), shows that Walensky is aware that her agency gave false information.
Walensky’s letter included no explanation of why that happened.
The letter “lacked any justification for why CDC performed PRRS during certain periods and not others,” Johnson, the top Republican on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Investigations, told Walensky in a response.
“You also provided no explanation as to why Dr. Su’s assertion … completely contradicts the CDC’s [initial] response … as well as your September 6, 2022, response to me,” he added.
He demanded answers from the CDC on the situation, including why the CDC did not perform PRRs until March and why the agency misinformed the public when it said no PRRs were conducted.
The CDC and Walensky did not respond to requests for comment.
“At no time have any CDC employees intentionally provided false information,” a CDC spokesperson, when correcting the agency’s previous responses, told The Epoch Times via email in August.
The spokesperson claimed that the false information was given because the CDC thought The Epoch Times and Children’s Health Defense, which received the first response, were asking about a different type of analysis called Empirical Bayesian data mining. But both The Epoch Times and Children’s Health Defense specifically listed PRRs in their queries.
The CDC has still not provided the results of the PRRs that were performed to The Epoch Times. It also did not provide them to Johnson. The Food and Drug Administration, which has conducted Empirical Bayesian data mining on Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System reports, recently refused to provideany of the results to the Epoch Times.
Walensky alleged in the new letter that Empirical Bayesian data mining is more reliable, and that the PRR results “were generally consistent with EB data mining, revealing no additional unexpected safety signals.”
“However, because of your failure to provide these analyses to Congress and to the American people, the public cannot verify your assertion,” Johnson said.
He added that the CDC’s “overall lack of transparency is unacceptable particularly in light of CDC’s inconsistent statements on this matter.”
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End racist vaccine mandate in Washington schools
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Reporter : Zachary Stieber, The Epoch Times PREMIUM
U.S. drug regulators are refusing to provide key analyses of a covi vaccine safety database, claiming that the factual findings cannot be separated by internal discussions protected by law.
The Epoch Times asked the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in July for all analyses performed by the agency for the covi vaccines using a method called Empirical Bayesian data mining, which involves comparing the adverse events recorded after a specific covi vaccine with those recorded after vaccination with non-covi vaccines.
According to operating procedures laid out by the agency and its partner in January 2021 and February 2022, the FDA would perform data mining “at least biweekly” to identify adverse events “reported more frequently than expected following vaccination with COVID-19 vaccines.” The agency would perform the mining on data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).
In a recent response, the FDA records office told The Epoch Times that it would not provide any of the analyses, even in redacted form.
The agency cited an exemption to the Freedom of Information Act that lets the government withhold inter-agency and intra-agency memorandums and letters “that would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency.”
The agency also pointed to the Code of Federal Regulations, which says that “all communications within the Executive Branch of the Federal government which are in written form or which are subsequently reduced to writing may be withheld from public disclosure except that factual information which is reasonably segregable in accordance with the rule established in § 20.22 is available for public disclosure.”
It’s not clear why the FDA could not produce copies of the analyses with non-factual information redacted. The Epoch Times has appealed the determination by the records office. The FDA declined to comment, citing the appeal.
"Unacceptable"
Kim Witczak, co-founder of Woodymatters, a nonprofit that advocates for a stronger FDA and drug safety system, said the agency’s refusal to provide the analyses was not acceptable.
“The secrecy is unacceptable for an agency that said it is transparent with the public about vaccine safety,” Witczak, who sits on one of the FDA’s outside advisory panels, told The Epoch Times.
“What’s the point of having VAERS if you’re not releasing it to the public?” she added.
Witczak said her concerns about vaccine safety were heightened by a recent paper from Dr. Joseph Fraiman and others that found a higher incidence of serious adverse events in vaccinated participants in the original Pfizer and Moderna vaccine trials than in placebo recipients. She noted that the FDA’s 2004 warning for antidepressants that the drugs could increase the risk of suicidal thoughts and behavior came over 10 years after the trials on which it was based.
“If this data is available, shame on you for not making it known to the public,” Witczak said. “It’s as if they don’t trust the people to make their own best decision for what’s good for them and their families.”
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), according to the documents outlining operating procedures, was going to perform a different type of data mining analyses, called Proportional Reporting Ratio (PRR) mining.
The CDC has also refused, so far, to provide the results for those analyses.
It has also twice provided false information when responding to questions.
The agency initially said that no PRR analyses were done and that data mining is “outside of th[e] agency’s purview.” The agency then said that it did perform PRRs, starting in February 2021.
Later, the agency acknowledged that wasn’t true. The agency did not begin performing PRRs until March 2022, a spokesperson told The Epoch Times.
Roger Andoh, a records officer, gave the initial response, citing the CDC’s Immunization and Safety Office. Dr. John Su, a CDC official, gave the second response. It remains unclear with whom the information originated.
The Epoch Times has submitted Freedom of Information Act requests for internal emails that may provide answers.
Data mining reports
The Empirical Bayesian (EB) is focused on identifying disproportional numbers of adverse events, CDC scientist Dr. Tom Shimabukuro said in January 2021. It identifies “with a high degree of confidence, adverse event-vaccine pairs reported at least twice as frequently as expected for a COVID-19 vaccine compared to the VAERS database,” he said, or a comparison between the incidence of a specific event such as kidney disease after COVID-19 vaccine compared to the incidence of the same event after all other U.S.-licensed vaccines.
The FDA and CDC have provided periodic updates on the EB data mining effort.
“Importantly, there were no Empirical Bayesian data mining alerts detected for any adverse event COVID-19 vaccine pairs as of the last data mining run that the FDA performed on February 18th,” Shimabukuro told members of the FDA’s vaccine advisory panel on Feb. 26, 2021.
In a review memorandum (pdf) for an expansion of the emergency authorization granted to Pfizer’s vaccine, FDA researchers said that data through April 16, 2021, showed only a possible signal for body temperature.
In the journal Vaccine in June 2021, FDA researchers said an analysis of cases of blood clotting after the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines did not suggest a safety concern. The FDA and CDC paused the Johnson & Johnson vaccine in April 2021 over cases of blood clotting, some fatal, but lifted the pause just 10 days afterward. The FDA later restricted use of the Johnson & Johnson shot.
In a paper in the CDC’s quasi-journal in August 2021, FDA and CDC researchers said that the FDA used EB mining to monitor events in children aged 12 to 17 after vaccination. The results indicated a lack of a safety signal for post-vaccination heart inflammation, or myocarditis, though other surveillance systems had detected the issue as an adverse event.
In a preprint study in October 2021 later published in The Lancet, government scientists said no adverse health outcomes were identified with the EB mining.
In a preprint in May 2022, scientists, including Su, said that EB mining analyzing data through 12 November 2021, revealed only one signal for VAERS death reports, for “vaccination failure” after receipt of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is not authorized in the United States.
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Trump lawyers fire back after DOJ asks to continue review of documents seized by FBI
Reporter : Jack Phillips, The Epoch Times PREMIUM / Image of Donald Trump and Melania Trump : Samuel Corum/AFP via Getty Images
Former President Donald Trump’s lawyers on 12 September 2022 urged a federal judge to reject the Department of Justice’s bid to continue reviewing documents that were taken during the FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago.
Trump’s lawyers argued that the materials that were taken by FBI agents on Aug. 8 may not be classified. While he was president, Trump had broad latitude in declassifying documents and has a “right to access” any presidential records whether they are classified or declassified, the attorneys added.
“In what at its core is a document storage dispute that has spiraled out of control, the Government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th President of his own Presidential and personal records,” Trump’s team wrote (pdf) to federal Judge Aileen Cannon, a Trump appointee.
Last week, Cannon sided with Trump and ordered that a special master be appointed to review the materials that were taken during the raid. A special master is generally a retired judge or prosecutor who is named to act as an independent arbiter on the court’s behalf.
When FBI agents arrived in August, they took 11 sets of allegedly classified documents from Mar-a-Lago, asserting that some were marked “top secret.” Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors also alleged the empty folders that had classified markings were found during the raid, and in one court filing, they included a photo that showed several documents scattered on the floor, some marked ‘TOP SECRET.”
Prosecutors further said that there is a likelihood that “improperly stored classified information may have been accessed by others and compromised,” which is a “core aspect” of the investigation.
The DOJ last week submitted its request (pdf) for a stay of portions of Cannon’s order pending an appeal to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. When Cannon issued her order, she also halted any use of materials for the DOJ’s investigation but stipulated the Intelligence Community assessment could continue.
As it stands, the Florida judge’s order risks “irreparable harm to our national security and intelligence interests” by allegedly undermining the Intelligence Community’s efforts to review the materials.
Mar-a-Lago is a secure facility
On 12 September, Trump’s lawyers argued that Mar-a-Lago, a sprawling resort and golf club located in Florida, is a secure facility.
Mar-a-Lago is a “secure” company with “controlled access” that was “utilized regularly to conduct the official business of the United States during the Trump Presidency, which to this day is monitored by the United States Secret Service,” his team noted.
“The Government generally points to the alleged urgent need to conduct a risk assessment of possible unauthorized disclosure of purported ‘classified records.’ But there is no indication any purported ‘classified records’ were disclosed to anyone,” Trump’s lawyers wrote.
His team asserted that as president, he “enjoys absolute authority under the Executive Order to declassify any information” and there is “no legitimate contention that the Chief Executive’s declassification of documents requires approval of bureaucratic components of the executive branch.”
“Yet,” the lawyers added, “the Government apparently contends that President Trump, who had full authority to declassify documents, ‘willfully’ retained classified information in violation of the law. Moreover, the Government seeks to preclude any opportunity for consideration of this issue.”
Trump has said on social media and in interviews that he declassified a range of materials while he was president. At one point, he pointed to a memorandum that he issued on his final day in office that declassified certain documents relating to the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane investigation.
In the special master court battle, Trump’s proposed special masters were Paul Huck Jr., a Florida-based attorney who advised former Gov. Charlie Crist, and Raymond Dearie, a former federal judge from New York who also sat on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
The DOJ, meanwhile, proposed Barbara Jones, a former federal judge who has handled several special master duties in recent high-profile cases, and Thomas Griffith, a former federal appeals court judge who retired two years ago.
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The newly unredacted portions
show that Mr. Trump handed over additional documents with classification
markings in response to a grand jury subpoena. Those materials were in addition
to the original 15 boxes of records that Mr. Trump provided the National
Archives in January.
“Since
the fifteen boxes were provided to [National Archives], documents bearing
classifications markings, which appear to contain [national defense
information] and were stored at the premises in an unauthorized location, have
been produced to the government in response to a grand jury subpoena,” the
unredacted portion of the affidavit says.
The affidavit also revealed
that some of those classified documents contained files marked, “HCS, SI, and
FISA,” some of the U.S. government’s highest security designations.
“HCS”
refers to confidential human sources, or spies, and the information they’ve
gathered; “SI” refers to work done by the National Security Agency; and “FISA”
deals with domestic surveillance and wiretapping of potential foreign threats
to the U.S.
The 15 boxes of materials that
Mr. Trump voluntarily returned to the National Archives in January had similar
markings.
Also revealed Tuesday was that
a grand jury subpoena was served to Mr. Trump’s team on 24 June 2022. The
subpoena demanded that the Trump Organization turn over “any and all
surveillance records” from the basement in Mar-a-Lago — where some of the
sensitive documents allegedly had been stored since 10 January 2022.
Mr. Trump’s legal team complied
with the subpoena on 6 July 2022, handing the FBI a hard drive, according to the
affidavit.
U.S. Magistrate Bruce Reinhart
signed off on the FBI’s search warrant for the August 8 search at
Mar-a-Lago based on the affidavit.
Currently, Mr. Trump’s legal
team and the Justice Department are sparring over having a special master
review the documents seized by the FBI.
While the Justice Department and Mr. Trump have agreed on one
candidate, it is up to U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon to decide how many
candidates should serve as special masters. The Justice Department is asking
her to appoint three candidates.
News (10)
Trump, Justice Department propose special master candidates
Reporters : Eric Tucker etal., Associated Press / https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/sep/9/trump-eyes-raymond-dearie-paul-huck-jr-special-mas/
The Justice Department and Donald Trump’s
legal team proposed candidates Friday for the role of an independent arbiter in
the investigation into top-secret documents found at the former president’s
Florida home, but the two sides differed on the scope of duties the person would
have.
Lawyers for Trump said they
believe the so-called special master should review all documents seized by the
FBI during its search last month of Mar-a-Lago, including records with
classification markings, and filter out any that may be protected by claims of
executive privilege.
The Justice Department said it does not
believe the arbiter should be permitted to inspect classified records or to
take into account potential claims of executive privilege.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon had given both sides
until Friday to submit potential candidates for the role of a special master,
as well as proposals for the scope of the person’s duties and the schedule for
his or her work.
The Justice Department submitted
the names of two retired judges — Barbara Jones, who served on the federal
bench in Manhattan and performed the same role in prior high-profile
investigations, and Thomas Griffith, a former federal appeals court jurist in
the District of Columbia.
The Trump team proposed one retired
judge, Raymond Dearie — also the former top federal prosecutor in the Eastern
District of New York — and prominent Florida lawyer Paul Huck Jr.
The back-and-forth over the special master is playing out
amid an FBI investigation into the retention of several hundred classified
documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago within the past year. Though the legal
wrangling is unlikely to have major long-term effects on the criminal
investigation or knock it significantly off course, it will almost certainly
delay it and has already caused the intelligence community to temporarily pause
a national risk assessment.
Over the
strenuous objections of the Justice Department, Cannon
on Monday granted the Trump team’s request for the special master and directed
the department to temporarily halt its review of records for investigative
purposes.
She said the
person would be responsible for sifting through the records recovered during
the August 8 search of Mar-a-Lago and filtering out any documents potentially
covered by claims of attorney-client or executive privilege.
Roughly 11,000 documents — including more than 100 with
classified markings, some at the top-secret level — were recovered during the
search. That’s on top of classified documents contained in 15 boxes retrieved
in January by the National Archives and Records Administration, and additional
sensitive government records the department took back during a June visit to
Mar-a-Lago.
The Justice Department had
objected to the Trump team’s request for a special master, saying it had
already completed its own review in which identified a limited subset of
records that possibly involve attorney-client privilege. It has maintained that
executive privilege does not apply in this investigation because Trump, no
longer president, had no right to claim the documents as his.
The
department on Thursday filed a notice of appeal indicating that it would
contest the judge’s order to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta.
Officials asked the judge to lift her hold on their investigative work pending
their appeal, as well as her requirement that the department share with a
special master the classified records that were recovered.
It is not clear whether Trump or anyone else will be charged.
News (11)
Justice Department to accept Trump's pick for special master
Reporters : Victor Moron etal., The Washington Times / https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/sep/12/raymond-dearie-trump-special-master-nominee-be-acc/ / Image of Mar-a-Lago : Steve Helber. This is an aerial view of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, 10 August 2022, in Palm Beach, Fla. The discovery of hundreds of classified records at Donald Trump's home has thrust U.S. intelligence agencies into a familiar and uncomfortable role as the foil of a former president who demanded they support his agenda and at times accused officers of treason.
The Justice Department agreed Monday to former President Donald Trump’s choice for a special master to adjudge the dispute over papers seized by the FBI in the raid on his Mar-a-Lago home.
According to court papers filed
Monday, the department agreed to Judge Raymond J. Dearie for the post.
Judge Dearie is a former chief
federal judge in New York who now enjoys senior status in Brooklyn federal
court, which means he can take on a lighter case load. He was appointed to the
bench by former President Reagan.
The 78-year-old judge also served as a U.S. attorney and
as a judge on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which reviews
sensitive intelligence cases.
Prosecutors
asked U.S. District Court Judge Aileen M. Cannon to appoint Mr. Dearie along
with its two proposed picks; retired Judge Barbara S. Jones, who acted as
a special master in an investigation of former Trump attorney Rudolph W.
Giuliani, and Thomas B. Griffith, a retired appeals judge for the District of
Columbia Circuit.
“Each
have substantial judicial experience, during which they have presided over
federal criminal and civil cases, including federal cases involving national
security and privilege concerns,” prosecutors wrote.
Mr. Trump’s legal team had also
nominated Paul Huck Jr., who previously served as the deputy attorney general
in Florida and as a general counsel to former Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who
at the time was a Republican. The Justice Department said in its filing that
it opposes Mr. Huck’s nomination because he doesn’t have the experience with
national security and privilege cases.
In a separate filing, Mr.
Trump’s attorneys said the Justice Department’s proposed special master
candidates are “not suitable” for the job, but they did not explain why.
“Plaintiff objects to the
proposed nominees of the Department of Justice. Plaintiff believes there
are specific reasons why those nominees are not preferred for service as
special master in this case,” the Trump attorneys wrote.
The lawyers said Judge Cannon
did not ask for detailed reasoning about their objections but they said they
would provide it if she requested.
Judge Cannon still must
approve who or how many candidates will serve as special master, but it is rare
for a judge to reject a mutually-agreed-on adjudicator. It is unclear when she
would issue a ruling.
In a Labor Day ruling, Judge
Cannon granted Mr. Trump’s request to appoint a special master to review
documents seized at Mar-a-Lago during the August 8 FBI raid.
She dismissed objections by the Justice Department, who raised concerns that
the appointment of a special master would slow down its criminal investigation
into Mr. Trump’s potential mishandling of classified government documents.
Earlier on Monday, Mr. Trump’s team filed court papers
calling for speedy implementation of Judge Cannon’s order that a special master
should review the seized documents to see whether any should be kept from
federal prosecutors because they are shielded by attorney-client or
presidential privileges.
News (12)
Most voters say Biden was consulted, profited from son's overseas dealings
Reporter : Ramsey Touchberry, The Washington Times / https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/sep/11/poll-most-voters-say-biden-was-consulted-profited-/
The
majority of voters think President Biden was
consulted about and profited from Hunter Biden’s
overseas business dealings, according to a poll showing that suspicions about
influence peddling and corruption are not subsiding as the president’s term
approaches the halfway mark.
A whopping 62% of likely voters
told Rasmussen Reports that Mr. Biden was
likely involved in Hunter Biden’s
far-flung business dealings, including at least one deal involving a company in
mainland China.
One-third of voters said they
do not think it is likely that Mr. Biden was
consulted about his son’s
deals.
“The
abandoned laptop that revealed Hunter Biden’s
foreign business dealing remains an important story, according to voters, many
of whom think it could have changed the 2020 election,” the pollsters said.
Indeed, questions are not going
away about foreign business deals brokered by Hunter Biden and
other family members while Mr. Biden was
vice president in the Obama administration.
Recently revealed emails from the laptop computer showed Hunter
Biden telling a business partner that he would be “happy” to introduce their associates to a
Chinese Communist Party official he met in
Beijing during a 2013 trip with his vice presidential father.
The request for the introduction, which Fox News first
reported, came from a former partner in Hunter Biden’s investment firm
that the government-controlled Bank of China financed.
Prosecutors
are reportedly weighing charges against Hunter Biden for tax violations and false statements to
federal authorities about improperly buying a firearm. How close the
investigation gets to the president remains to be seen.
As more
comes to light about how the Justice Department, social media and news
organizations intentionally suppressed stories during the 2020 campaign about
the contents of Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop computer, voters are split on
whether it would have changed the outcome of the presidential race.
Nearly half
of respondents, 48%, said Mr. Biden likely would not have won the election if Hunter Biden’s laptop computer received more media coverage.
About the
same amount, 46%, said they do not think the story would have changed the
election results, according to the poll.
Many news
outlets did not report about the laptop computer, which was discovered in
October 2020 after it was abandoned in a Delaware repair shop. News
organizations, social media platforms and Democratic-allied pundits cited fears
that the laptop could be Russian disinformation and another attempt to meddle
in a U.S. presidential election but the laptop’s contents, which include
evidence of how Hunter Biden attempted to use his family connections to grease business deals overseas,
were eventually confirmed by legacy news operations such as The New York Times.
The
results of the Rasmussen survey, conducted on 31 August and 1 September 2022
among 1,000 likely voters, arrive as the FBI faces increased accusations of
politicization. Those accusations extend to the FBI’s raid of former President
Donald Trump’s residence and office at his private Mar-a-Lago club in Palm
Beach, Florida. It was the first time federal law enforcement searched the home
of a former U.S. president.
Whistleblowers say federal
investigators slow-walked the probe into Mr. Biden’s son until after the 2020
election. Republicans have promised to investigate the charges if they win
control of Congress. The laptop, which contains emails, text messages, photos
and other material related to Hunter Biden’s
business deals, was initially dismissed by the intelligence community and much
of the media as Russian disinformation.
Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin,
a Republican who has led calls for the FBI watchdog to investigate how the
agency has handled the case, said last month that an FBI whistleblower has
revealed the “FBI’s apparent corruption” in the Hunter Biden investigation.
“After the FBI obtained the
Hunter Biden laptop from the Wilmington, DE
computer shop, these whistleblowers stated that local FBI leadership told
employees, ‘you will not look at that Hunter Biden
laptop’ and that the FBI is ‘not going to change the outcome of the election
again,’” Mr. Johnson, the ranking member of the permanent subcommittee on
investigations, wrote to Justice Department Inspector General Michael
Horowitz.
Mr. Johnson and Sen. Chuck
Grassley of Iowa, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, presented bank
records showing that Hunter Biden and
the president’s brother, James Biden,
received millions of dollars from companies tied to China.
Hunter Biden has
denied any wrongdoing, and the White House has rejected the notion that Mr. Biden
ever discussed foreign business dealings with his son.
Still, Hunter Biden and his laptop
computer remain a thorn in the administration’s side.
The FBI investigation began in
2018. U.S. Attorney David Weiss in Delaware, appointed by Mr. Trump, is leading
the probe.
The CEO of Meta, formerly known
as Facebook, said last week that the popular social media website limited
exposure to stories about Hunter Biden’s
laptop on the platform after receiving warnings about potential disinformation
from the FBI.
Mark Zuckerberg defended the
action to podcaster Joe Rogan because Russia attempted to use Facebook during
the 2016 election.
The existence of the laptop was
first reported by the New York Post ahead of the 2020 election and was widely
ridiculed as propagating false information from Russia, only to later be
reported about by a wide range of media outlets.
The Rasmussen survey had a margin of error of 3 percentage
points.
News (13) to (15) / Reporter : Li Enzhen / Editor: Wen Hui / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2022/09/14/a103527688.html
News (13)
栗战书在海参崴与普京会晤 被指“屈辱”
Russian soldiers are refusing to fight in Ukraine amid Moscow’s rising losses, it was claimed at night of 13 September 2022.
A lightning counter-offensive by Kyiv last week has pushed Vladimir Putin’s invaders right back to the border in parts of the north-east of the country, reclaiming huge swatches of territory lost in the early days of the war.
The blitz forced Russian troops to either flee or surrender en masse, with videos on social media purporting to show Moscow’s soldiers lying down in the road in front of Kyiv’s forces as they ‘understand the hopelessness of their situation’, Ukrainian military intelligence said.
The embarrassing turnaround was also said to be having an impact at home for Putin.
‘Learning about the number of dead [estimated to be up to 43,000], Russian troops are refusing to fight on the territory of Ukraine, payments to the wounded occupiers have been halted,’ said Serhiy Haidai, the governor of Luhansk.
"The military command of the Russian Federation suspended the dispatch of new, already formed units to the territory of Ukraine," he added .
His claims were backed up by The Institute of War. The US think-tank said Kyiv’s gains in the north-east Kharkiv region ‘may be impacting the will or ability of the Russian military command to use newly formed volunteer units in Ukraine in a timely fashion’.
U.S. intelligence officials told the Washington Post they expect to see further humiliating retreats made by Moscow’s armed forces.
"The Russians are in trouble," one source said. "Their weaknesses have been exposed and they don’t have great manpower reserves or equipment reserves." Another senior Western official said it was ‘too early to say’ whether the gains made by Ukraine amounted to ‘a turning point’ in the six-month war.
"But it’s a moment that has power in terms of both operations and psychology," the official said. ‘It’s exactly what the Ukrainians need right now. They need that success, and they need that winning narrative. I would describe it as scoring a goal before half-time.’
Last night President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine was in full control of more than 1,500 square miles of recaptured territory and is stabilising a further area of the same size. On Monday, he had said Ukraine had retaken more than 2,000 square miles in its recent counter-offensive.
Ukrainian officials, though, said it was important to make a distinction between taking territory and ensuring it was totally safe.
Kyiv said the army yesterday took control of Vovchansk – a town just two miles from the border and which had been under occupation since February.
Across Kharkiv, Ukrainian soldiers marked their victories by burning Russian flags. They inspected the remains of abandoned and charred enemy tanks while brothers-in-arms helped the wounded join the celebrations.
In London, the Ministry of Defence, in its daily briefing, said that the rout by the Ukrainian armed forces had ‘severely degraded’ one of Russia’s most prestigious tank units. The First Guards Tank Army could take years to rebuild, officials said. The unit ‘had been one of the most prestigious of Russia’s armies, allocated for the defence of Moscow, and intended to lead counter-attacks in the case of a war with Nato’, the MoD added.
News (25)
Dissent against Putin is growing in Moscow, calls for Putin's resignation
Now dissent in Moscow is growing. One of Putin’s own MPs Mikhail Sheremet added his voice to criticism from military experts calling on the Kremlin strongman to start conscripting troops into the war. ‘Without full mobilisation, transferring to a military footing, including the economy, we will not achieve the proper results,’ he said.
Nearly 50 regional politicians have signed a petition calling on their leader to resign over his botched campaign in Ukraine.
News (26)
Germany fearful of supplying arms to Ukraine
Ukraine slammed Berlin on 13 September 2022 for its failure to deliver Leopard tanks and Marder fighting vehicles despite repeated pleas from Kyiv. It claimed chancellor Olaf Scholz had repeatedly broken promises on arms.
"Not a single rational argument on why these weapons cannot be supplied, only abstract fears and excuses," foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
News (27)
俄地方民代吁普京下台 恐面临解散命运
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